1. Field
The following description relates to an apparatus and method of controlling power consumption, and more particularly, to an apparatus and method of effectively controlling power consumption of graphic processing unit (GPU) resources.
2. Description of the Related Art
A graphic processing unit (GPU) is a three-dimensional rendering device that is essential to various apparatuses, such as a desktop computer, a laptop computer, a mobile phone, and a media player. In order to improve a user's visual experience, it is important to improve the function and performance of the GPU and reduce the power consumption of the GPU.
Most applications using the GPU, such as a game, a user experience (UX), and a computer-added design (CAD), need a graphics pipeline function, and recent applications using only a computing function also utilizes the GPU. Examples thereof are applications based on programming architecture, such as CUDA or OpenCL. Such applications perform operations in parallel.
When the applications using only the computing function are executed, pipeline functions, except for several resources such as a core processor of a CPU and a texture unit for processing image data, are not used. Accordingly, unused resources may be operated at a low power level.